LONDON,
12 March 1998 - Henri Cartier-Bresson, founder of the
seminal Magnum photographic agency, captured some of the most
extraordinary images of the 20th century. The Hayward Gallery is now
exhibiting 50 years of the photographer's European work alongside
paintings by his friend, Francis Bacon (until 5 April). Bacon's work
here focuses on the human body, and although wildly different in its
approach from Cartier-Bresson, both have the supreme ability to
understand and depict the drama of the human condition.

Bacon
breaks down the customary barriers in his paintings of the human body:
stylised almost unrecognisable biomorphic figures in tense poses amid
a backdrop of bright oranges and mauves, giving them an almost
cartoon-like feel. In a triptych about the death of his friend George
Dyer, an everyday experience such as defecating becomes an arduous,
painful and dark moment. Cartier-Bresson, on the other hand,
understands humanity. His pictures are simplistic in nature, but
somehow manage to convey the full range of human emotion, from simple
pride and bemusement to the complex notion of patriotism: people just
are. It is invariably the triumph of the "decisive moment" -
a moment where light, form, composition and subject come together in
an almost zen-like unity.

There is a blur to Bacon's work, almost a sense of flux between the
subject and the background (sometimes black, where the viewer is not
invited), which can be interpreted either as a sense of movement or
some hyper-real plane where mutually exclusive events simultaneously
take place. Cartier-Bresson's moments are still, but nonetheless have
an incredible sense of dynamic visual balance: whether geometric -
through neat, imaginary diagonals and horizontals underpinning the
visual structure - or emotional - the contrasts in the human
condition, for example, a person sleeping in the street while a woman
passes with a strong expression of disgust. It is just such a
juxtaposition, caught in an instant, that is part of the genius of
Cartier-Bresson.

Bacon once said, "I've got an obssession with
doing the one perfect image." He may even have done so by the
time he died in 1992, as befits his status as one of the greatest
British painters of the 20th century. It is fitting that his work be
shown alongside that of Cartier-Bresson who began his training as an
artist; although he gave up photography in 1970 to concentrate on
drawing, his work is testament to his ability to capture a fleeting
image.

Cartier-Bresson celebrates his 90th birthday this
year, with two more exhibitions scheduled in London. Looking at his
work, we wonder whether it is the historical persepctive that makes us
more receptive to and perceptive about older photographs, or simply
that great photographs, taken with deep empathy and understanding of
the subject matter, will always be classic.